The Wolverine, Film Reivew

X-Men, Origins: Wolverine, is a painfully bad film this is due to the fact that the film maker of that film buggered up Wolverine back story and we don’t even need to mention what they did to Deadpool. Luckily Deadpool has got his own film coming out early 2016 Staring Ryan Reynolds. Check out the test footage/ trailer found on youtube to get an idea of what it will be like.
Given how bad X-Men, Origins: Wolverine was it looked unlikely that everyone’s little runt of a mutant would get another standalone film. But thanks to his popularity and Jackman’s portrait of him. 20th Century Fox has given us The Wolverine.

The film takes place sometime after X-Men: The Last Stand, Logan has returned to Canada and living in the wildness, only venturing into town to pick up supplies when he needs them.
Logan, is tormented by survivor’s guilt and is haunted by recurring visions of his deceased love Jean Grey (Famke Janssen). Unknown to Logan he has been tracked down by Yukio (Rila Fukushima). She informs Logan that her employer Yashida (Hal Yamanouchi) has requested that he see Logan one last time before he dies. (Logan saved Yashida in the Second World War when the A Bomb was dropped on Nagasaki.) Logan is convinced and heads off to Japan to see Yashida. On his death bed Yashida offers to take Logan healing factor so that Logan will be mortal and Yashida can live.

The first ¾ of the film is very much in the style of a film Noir, this gives the film a totally different feel to X-Men, Origins: Wolverine. While the film is not action packed it does have some great action in it and you can see the influence of Chris Claremont-Frank Miller Japan Saga from Wolverine own comic. However the final act of the film is the biggest let down, going from a film Noir style to your typical Superhero flick, we also get to see Sliver Samurai, but like Deadpool, it is not the one fan’s love from the comics which is a great shame. The Character of Viper (Svetlana Khodchenkova) is not really need in the film and is only there for a major plot point that could have been done another way.

Hugh Jackman is at his best as Logan/ Wolverine and really buffed himself up for the role; furthermore, this film offers the most captivating portrayal of the character put on the big screen yet.

The Wolverine feel like it should a 15 rated film (R Rated) but has been toned down for a PG-13 rating. There is still plenty of blood from Logan slashing up the Yakuza and Ninja’s, but none of the gore. It’s also shows a little of Japans underworld, but the story really does not have a moment to go into depth with it.
What little action scene that are in the film are entertaining especially the fight on top of a Bullet Train hurtling through Tokyo.

The Wolverine is an entertaining film and this is what a Wolverine standalone film should be.
It just a shame that the final act of the film lets it down, but at least it does not even come close to the awfulness of X-Men, Origins: Wolverine climax. It’s because of this I am giving The Wolverine a 4 of 5.
Be sure to stick around after the end credit sequence for a scene film by Brain Singer that will lead to his return to the X-Men Franchise with X-Men: Days of Futures Past.

4 responses

I actually like the Origins film, though I admit to not being much of an expert on X-Men comics or the origins of Wolverine anyway. Though, I do find it funny how people complain about the movies not being like the comics, when most comics have been done and redone many times, especially origin stories. I don’t know how often this happens in Marvel, but it seems like every 10-15 years or so DC does new origin stories for their characters. I do agree that Deadpool sucked in that film, though I am by no means a fan of the character anyway. It is good for fans that they’re finally doing that film, though. It seemed for the longest time that it wouldn’t happen.

I agree with your assassment of The Wolverine. I really enjoyed the first 3/4, but the end really sucked. It was too predictable, for one thing. Plus, I thought the earlier parts of the film were a really well written character piece. Logan was the tormented soul seeking an end to his pain. Plus, it was nice seeing him vulnerable when his healing factor was deactivated. Unfortunately, once it was restored, the movie descended into an average action flick. Wolverine goes on a rampage, kills the bad guy and rescues the girl, yadda yadda. Too bad it had to be that way. I did find it interesting that they cut off his adamantium claws, leaving him with his natural bone claws. Though, I find it a bit unrealistic that taking his bone marrow would give somebody else his regenerative powers. For one thing, I know it was never said in the earlier films that that was the source of his mutation, though I don’t know if it ever came up in the comics. I did like the very end bit with Charles Xavier and Magneto. Overall, a decent flick, though I’m not sure if I want to add it to my collection. I probably will eventually. I still need to see the latest X-Men flick. If I wind up owning that one, I’ll probably get this one to complete the collection.

Marvel tend not to redo origins stories. But they do to make small changes to them, but this due to an event that has changed the timeline in some way, but then a few years later they do another story where it set to how it was originally.
They did come up with new Origins stories for all their characters back in the early 00’s. But this was under the Ultimate’s comic line. Which is not part of their prime Universe. The Idea behind the line was, that given the Prime Universe long history, it’s a bit hard for new reader to get into it. So starting form fresh and gave them way to get new reader. It worked really well, but they ended the line a few years ago, but sure what the reason for that was, but it might have something to do with their current storyline where all the different marvel universe will become one, in Secret Wars to be followed by Battle World.

I remember Ultimate Spider-Man. I had some of those. Good line. It was a 2000-era update to the Spider-Man story, with changes like him knowing Mary Jane back in high school. I’ve been thinking of getting those and the Ultimate X-Men in digital format.

DC goes nuts with theirs. Seriously, every X years they do a reboot. Then, every once in a while, they do an “event” that merges all of the comic continuities into one, such as the Crisis on Infinite Earths back in the 1970s and the “New 52” thing they did back in 2011, where they merged all of their heroes’ multiple books into one book for each character. But, it’s still a big mess, in my opinion. The New 52 didn’t make anything easier to get into, you still have to know the back stories of the characters.

I really don’t like newer comics and this type of weird stuff, unless it’s something where they completely start over, like they did with the Marvel Ultimate line. Too bad they had to cancel that line. It probably wasn’t selling well. I’ve actually been reading a lot of comics from back in the 1960s. I have a big book of the first 20 Hal Jordan Green Lantern comics from 1959 and the early ’60s. I also recently bought three books of early Spider-Man, the first three “Essential Spider-Man” books. I love stuff from back then, seeing how comics were done originally, before their back stories became convoluted messes full of retcons and flat-out rewrites.